What to install on an amd64 machine?

[Eugen Leitl]

On Mon, Dec 27, 2004 at 03:37:20PM +0100, Alexander Volovics wrote:

> In 2 weeks time I will be getting an amd64 machine and I have
> been reading up on possible problems.
> Because the answers to the questions I would like answered are
> contaminated with hardware/software issues when googling or reading
> mailing lists I hope to get some unequivocal answers here.
> 
> - Can you install FC3-i386 on an amd64 machine without problems?
>   Can the FC3-i386 kernel and drivers handel the hardware without
>   problems?

Check out the supported hardware list. My Asus A8V Deluxe doesn't seem to run
into problems (getting FC3 to boot with a mixed PATA/SATA can be tricky, as
you have to jiggle drive boot priority in BIOS).
 
> - Looking at the packages contained in FC3-x86_64 I see both i386
>   and x86_64 versions for a lot of things. For example:
>   hal-0.4.0-10.i386.rpm and hal-0.4.0-10.x86_64.rpm.
>   Are the i386 versions included for 'compat' reasons, so you can
>   run i386 apps under FC3-x86_64?

No, if you have x86_64 OS, you need the x86_64 packages. This might be less
packages, if you're hooked on livna & Co.

>   And are they installed by default when doing a standard workstation
>   install or do you add them if necessary?
>   If they are available for 'compat' reasons are they sufficient for
>   all i386 apps I would like to run or do you sometimes have to add
>   extra i386 libraries?
>   Can i386 libraries always coexist with x86_64 libraries without
>   problems?
> 
> - Do up2date/yum function faultlessly when adding i386 apps to
>   a machine running FC3-x86_64.

I don't think so.
 
> - If both FC3-i386 and FC3-x86_64 can run on an amd64 machine without
>   problems are there significant advantages for the x86_64 version?

x86_64 has some fresh blood dripping down edge of the blade. Most of things work,
but you'll see less support when you'll run into problems. E.g. you'll have
trouble getting 3d acceleration going with ATI's binary drivers with newish
Radeons. I've given up on my 9600, and installed an nVidia instead which
worked well. I've had build issues with openhbci stuff. Expect lots more
breakage if you're used to ./configure && make && make install litany.
 
> - I will be getting a MSI K8N Neo2 Platinum board with an Athlon64
>   3500+ socket 399 and an UDMA100 hard drive. Does anybody know of
>   any special problems when installing either FC3-i386 or FC3-x86_64?

Judging from
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=MSI+K8N+Neo2+Platinum+x86_64&btnG=Google+Search
it seems to work.

-- 
Eugen* Leitl <a href="http://leitl.org">leitl</a>
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